Where your food comes from is as important as how you smoke it.
Live fire cooking and barbecue have been so intimately linked with human evolution and history and politics. Everything we do, barbecue informs it in some way.
Obviously this is the next frontier - once you've mastered grilling, smoking is what you're going to want to do.
If you're new to the smoking game, the first dish I suggest you smoke would be a pork shoulder. Unlike brisket or ribs, the meat is intrinsically tender. It's very well marbled both on the outside of the shoulder and throughout the meat, so even if you overcook it, even if you get a spike in temperature, it's very hard to screw up. It usually comes out moist, crispy and delicious no matter what you do to it.
One thing that has been fascinating to me is the exploding interest in traditional American barbecue in Europe. We Americans have historically always imported food ideas from other places, and now we are exporting this gastronomic treasure called barbecue.
My message is use grass-fed beef, use heirloom pork varieties, use organic chickens, wait until wild salmon or wild seafood are in season, smoke organic vegetables.
If you own a simple Weber kettle grill, you own a smoker. You don't have to spend an enormous amount of money or even buy an extra piece of equipment. If you have that kettle grill, the whole secret to getting a lower temperature is to set up your grill for indirect grilling and use only half as much charcoal.
I really love the smoked ice cream because it's so unexpected. Yet when you taste it, it's sort of familiar and otherworldly at the same time. I guess that's what I really like about what smoke does to food.
